QPX Express

Shutdown FAQs

What happened?

On October 31, 2017, we announced that we would be retiring the QPX
Express API, a service that we developed for long-tail travel clients
back in 2014. There has been some confusion about this change and its
impact on the travel industry, so we'd like to clarify exactly what's
going on.

Background

In 2010, Google acquired ITA Software to make it easier for
people to search for flights, compare flight options and prices, and
quickly identify where they can buy their tickets. At the time, ITA's
main offering was QPX for enterprise, a robust airfare pricing and
shopping platform used by airlines and intermediaries to power their
air travel e-commerce experiences. Today, QPX for enterprise enables
travel companies to process millions of user-generated flight queries
per day. Many
air travel shopping websites, including Google Flights, are built
on QPX for enterprise data.

QPX Express

QPX Express was an entirely separate product from QPX for
enterprise. In 2014, we introduced the QPX Express API, a similar
service created for small companies and individual users. This was a
very basic air travel pricing and shopping API that lacked the
advanced query types, performance optimizations, and support services
available to QPX for enterprise customers.

While some companies found the QPX Express API useful, there was
simply not enough adoption to continue supporting the product. As a
result, we informed users that we would be shutting down the QPX
Express API on April 10, 2018.

What this means

QPX for enterprise is not affected by the shutdown of QPX Express
— it's not going anywhere! Since we acquired ITA Software, we've
continued to expand QPX for enterprise's features and customer
base. It remains widely available to third parties in the travel
industry.

When Google acquired ITA Software, the Department of Justice
required Google to make QPX for enterprise available to third-party
travel companies for at least 5 years, an agreement that we upheld
through the entire term — and a practice that we continue to
uphold today. Some have confused the retiring of QPX Express with the
October 2016 expiry of the Department of
Justice's consent decree related to our acquisition of ITA,
but these two things are unrelated.

Our travel partners continue to have access to data provided by QPX
for enterprise as they have over the last 7 years, and will have in
the future. We're committed to collaborating with our partners to make
the entire online travel journey better for travelers around the
globe.

How long can I continue to use the QPX Express API?

The QPX Express API service ended on April 10, 2018.

What steps should I take?

You don't need to take any action. However, if you were actively using
the QPX Express API service, you may want to find an alternate solution.